Does Insurance Have to Pay for Building Code Upgrades on a Roof in Oklahoma?

In Oklahoma, where a policy includes ordinance or law coverage, the state’s insurance regulator has instructed carriers to treat every building code as strictly enforced, even in a city that does not inspect roofs. Arrowhead Roofing has worked storm claims across Tulsa since 1987, and that single instruction decides who pays for code items.

Note: this is a general explanation of Oklahoma insurance regulation and building code. It is not a statement about any particular policy. Arrowhead Roofing is not a licensed public adjuster and we do not negotiate insurance claims. What your policy covers is determined by your policy and your carrier.

These are the items that most often turn into a code question on a Tulsa roof.

The Short Answer

Ordinance or law coverage is the part of a property policy that pays the extra cost of rebuilding to current code rather than to whatever was there before. It is a separate coverage, and how much of it a policy carries varies.

What Oklahoma has settled is the argument underneath it. A carrier cannot decide that a code does not apply because the local jurisdiction does not enforce it. The Oklahoma Insurance Department has said so twice, nine years apart.

So the question is usually not whether the code applies. It is whether the policy carries ordinance or law coverage, and how much.

What Oklahoma’s Regulator Told Insurers

Bulletin PC 2016-02, issued by Insurance Commissioner John D. Doak on April 25, 2016, came out of complaints about storm-damaged roof repair. Some insurers were providing ordinance or law coverage for code items only where the local jurisdiction actively enforced the code.

The Department’s instruction is one sentence:

Companies are instructed that for purposes of providing additional coverages, as an exception to the ordinance or law exclusion, you shall consider all building codes as being strictly enforced.

The reasoning behind it is worth reading, because it is the part a homeowner can use. The Department found that Oklahoma adopted the International Residential Code on July 15, 2015, that it is in effect throughout the state, and that it constitutes the statewide minimum standards for residential construction under 59 O.S. § 1000.23 and OAC 748:20-5-11.1.

Then the line that answers the enforcement argument directly: “The enforcement or failure to enforce a law does not invalidate the law; it only means execution of the law is wanting.”

The Department went further. Conditioning coverage on the inconsistencies of local enforcement, it wrote, is “tantamount to encouraging and facilitating repair of insured property in contravention of laws designed to ensure public safety.” Selling additional coverage for a risk the insurer knows does not exist “constitutes the sale of illusory and unfairly discriminatory coverage.”

Commissioner Glen Mulready reaffirmed the bulletin in a Special Notice dated June 26, 2025. A regulator does not restate a nine year old instruction unless the practice came back.

What This Looks Like on a Tulsa Roof

The code items above are not theoretical. They are line items, and they are the ones that get questioned.

Ice and water shield in the valleys is the clearest example. Most Tulsa roofs built before the current code do not have it, so when it appears on an estimate it reads like an addition rather than a requirement.

Andy Anderson at Arrowhead puts it plainly: “Even if a roof doesn’t have ice and water shield in the valley, when we go back with it, it’s required. We’re going to put it in the valley.”

Decking is the other big one. A home with spaced sheathing or plank decking cannot take asphalt shingles under R905.2.1 without a solid deck, and that is a real cost that did not exist on the original roof.

What Changes the Answer

Whether the code applies is usually settled. What is not settled is how much of the resulting cost lands on the carrier, and three things decide that.

Whether the policy carries ordinance or law coverage at all

It is a distinct coverage, not part of the dwelling limit. Some policies include it, some offer it as an endorsement, and some carry a percentage cap rather than a dollar figure. Your declarations page is where that is written.

Whether the item is code or an upgrade

A code item is one the adopted code or the manufacturer’s installation instructions require, and R903.1 and R904.1 make the manufacturer’s instructions part of the code requirement. A better shingle than the one that was there is a different conversation.

Whether the claim settles at replacement cost or actual cash value

An actual cash value settlement and a replacement cost settlement handle the code portion differently, and more Oklahoma policies now carry age-based roof schedules than did five years ago.

Where the Code Ends and Our Own Standard Begins

There is a line here that we think is worth stating out loud, because it is a place a contractor could quietly pad an estimate.

Insurance pays what the code and the manufacturer require. Where we install above that minimum, that is on us, not added to your claim. Every roof we build gets six fasteners per shingle rather than the four a standard application calls for, and no part of that appears on a carrier’s estimate, because nobody requires it of us.

Where to Take a Code Question

Two places, in this order. Your carrier or your agent, because they are the only ones who can tell you what your policy covers. Then the Oklahoma Insurance Department’s Legal Division, which is where the Special Notice itself directs questions about the bulletin.

What we can do is document. We photograph and measure the roof, identify what the code and the manufacturer’s instructions require for that specific assembly, and provide a written scope of work an adjuster can read. We meet adjusters on the roof. We do not negotiate claims.

Related Questions

Does a carrier have to pay for a full tear-off instead of a second layer?

IRC R908.3 states that roof replacement includes removing existing layers down to the roof deck, so a layover is not a code compliant replacement. Whether the additional cost is covered still depends on the policy’s ordinance or law coverage.

Who decides how many nails go in each shingle?

The code sets how the fastener has to perform and the manufacturer’s instructions set the count, and R903.1 makes those instructions part of the requirement. How many nails per shingle does code require? walks through both.

Why is the material order bigger than the roof measurement?

Cuts at hips, valleys, and rakes mean some of every square gets thrown away, so the order carries a waste factor. How many bundles of shingles are in a square? shows the arithmetic on a real roof.

See Also

The two answers that sit underneath this one are the fastening standard the code actually sets, which is where R905.2.1 and the manufacturer’s instructions meet, and how a roof gets measured and ordered, which is where a decking line item comes from.